AIBU to expect MIL to follow our routine?

[RatherBeHappyThanDignified]

MIL looks after DS a couple of days a week but has very different ideas about how to look after a baby to mine and DH. She's said on numerous occasions things like "you can't force a baby to go to sleep!", "if they want you to do something you just have to do it!", "never wake a sleeping baby!" and the like. DH and I both work full time, so have had a somewhat flexible routine for DS since he was about 6 months. Although she rarely says anything explicit, I can tell she disapproves of this. She thinks that I should just let DS sleep whenever he falls asleep but the difference is that she was a STAHM when her kids were very young so had that option.

Anyway, when she looks after DS she seems to make the effort to actually put him down for a nap and not wait until he just physically falls asleep but she has huge problems with waking him up. DH had to actually ring her the other day to tell her to wake him up as it was late in the day and she went on and on about how much she hated it. It makes me feel like we're forcing her to be cruel.

AIBU to just want the baby to not be asleep past 4pm so that he's happy at bedtime and likely to sleep through? I don't want to be ungrateful as her looking after him is a great help to us but AIBU to think that if she's going to then she ought to just follow our rules and stop complaining?

My Mil never had dc for a child care but for her benefit only. And I can't deny it was a great days break for me. But it became clear when dd was awake till midnight.... She was letting toddler sleep in day. Then sleeping late spun us off on viscous circle for their rest of the week. It turned into huge pain for us. She almost lied about it Nd most other things like potty training et. Shame.

FGS she's the child's grandmother, she obviously loves him and she's looking after him beautifully. YAB inflexible and bonkers.

Are you actually the most unreasonable person ever OP?

I think you may be.

Jeez.

longer term it might be best for everyone to pay for childcare
But in less than a year they won't be needing a nap at all.
So longer term it's better just to ride it out? A few months? A year?

One of mine was a virtual non-sleeper nap or no nap so I've felt the pain. It's a relatively short phase for most.

Mind you.

I spot some other entitled types on here - who have free childcare from loving grandparents but apparently it isn't good enough?

Blimey. Get over yourselves.

My experience is of grandparents wanting to do the childcare and not wanting the grandchildren in nursery

I'm not sure I can agree with that and I have plenty of friends who are GPs!! Of course they love seeing them and having them for a day, but committing 2/3 days a week is another thing entirely!

It's not something I would do in a hurry. I have other fish to fry. Things to do! Places to go! If my dd couldn't afford nursery and absolutely needed to work then of course I'd step in. But..sheesh!

I don't think you ABU. Just because childcare is free, it doesn't mean you have to concede all parenting to the care giver or continually grovel with gratitude.

However, if it's not working out for you, maybe you do need to think of other options.

I struggle with this because we had grandparents who offered to take our DD when I went back to work but we chose instead put her into paid childcare 2 days a week. It cost a fortune and I returned to work on much shorter hours than I could have done otherwise. I was met with a total lack of sympathy from both sets of parents whenever I even mentioned in a hectic schedule/being tired/struggling to keep up with work etc because "we offered and would've loved to have her for you" I work with lots of women who have family childcare and I've yet to meet anyone who hasn't had problems with it. It almost seems like you're held to ransom over the fact that you're not paying! This doesn't sit well with me and I agree with op that it should be your rules... You are the parent and I would be inclined to suggest that if it doesn't fit mil routine to do it your way then she should tell you she can't do it so you can make other arrangements. We had a short term issue with naps in nursery when DD stopped napping with me but still was there, knock on effect was as you said she wouldn't sleep. The consequence of that does not fall solely on you though, I found I then had to wake my very tired little girl at 6am so that I could get to work again the next day. I asked nursery to stop the naps and they did straight away. Happy DD. Happy me. Routine restored :) DD now almost 6 and has a routine which suits both work and school, sleeps like clockwork and enjoys time with grandparents as grandparents rather than carers. Sister and sil however 'used grandparents as free childcare' (as that's how it's often put) and had numerous issues but felt they couldn't complain. Op hit the nail on the head with the sahp thing, both my mum and mil worked, but not when DC were preschool, what worked 30 years ago doesn't necessarily work now just because it did then. Grandparents are not substitute parents.

So you want MiL to have to deal with an unhappy fractious baby because you want her to wake him up before he's ready?

I wouldn't do it.

you've asked her to look after him so let her get on with it

I missed where the op said she'd asked her to look after him.

Personally I've been there and done that and would never have a regular family-childminding arrangement again.

My mum had mine at first, on her insistence. She doesn't work, she was really keen and wanted to have them. I also paid £100 a month...nowhere near childcare fees but just a token so that she wasn't out of pocket for any extras.

We were really grateful because it did save us a fortune. She did things differently to us at times but as young toddlers I just sucked it up when she ignored some requests.

As they got older (she had them for two years, from when they were 3 and 1 to 5 and 3) it only got worse. I'd make requests...please don't let ds2 have a nap after 5pm or he'll be up all night. Please don't let ds1 have free access to the biscuit barrel. Can you remember the steroid cream for ds2's bum (he had awful eczema around the nappy area). They'd be ignored. Ds1 would be stuffing ten biscuits every day after school. Ds2 was put down for a nap at 5.30 more and more often. She didn't put the cream on ds2 because in her opinion you didn't want to 'overload' then with meds and it was looking fine anyway.

The arrangement ended when we had a blazing row over food. Partly to make it easier for her and partly because I was very particular about food, I took their evening meal there every day she had them. Stuff like homemade stews or lasagne that could just be heated.

She started not giving them the meals I'd prepare. Over a few weeks, I'd turn up and be told 'oh I was cooking fish fingers anyway so they just had those' or 'ds1 said he didn't fancy lasagne so I did him some pizza and chips instead'. My mum isn't particularly great with healthy home cooking.

I politely asked so many times that she give the food I'd prepared...and after a while I put my foot down and said that that week three home cooked meals had gone in the bin and the dc had had fishfingers/pizza instead, it wasn't on and I wanted her to give them the food I made every day. It was a control thing and her response was basically that when they were under her roof, she'd do as she liked and I had no say on those days.

That was the last day she 'officially' minded them and me putting them with a childminder caused huge family ructions, two months of not speaking, tears about how cruel I was to dump them with a stranger rather than family.

Never again. Yanbu op. Just because it's family minding your dc doesn't mean you should completely relinquish all say in what happens on xyz day...because no matter who minds them YOU are the parent and others minding them should respect your choices or tell you that they can't do it.

It was a control thing - it sounds like a control thing on both sides. You wanted to remain in control by making food for your kids - but not actually be there to feed it to them, if they didn't want to eat it your mum made them something else. If you want to retain total control the best way is to do it yourself - otherwise a degree of compromise is required. Small children and babies do nap at odd times sometimes. If only it were possible to programme them to go to sleep and wake up at a time to suit their parents. Childcare from grandparents might be free, but the price you pay is that you risk a big fall out if you try to lay down the law. If you use a nursery or childminder you can be more dictatorial - they still might not get it exactly right according to your strict instructions, but it doesn't feel like a personal slight.

If you want your child's routine to be stuck to 100% get a nanny. Childminder and nurseries will do their best to stick to your routine but, with having several other children to care for too, need to have a degree of flexibility.

I disagree with majority of posters if grandparents are happy to help by doing childcare paid or unpaid then they should try to follow the childs routine as this is in the bests interests of the child not just the parent !! Mums are not being unreasoable to request the routine is adhered to - who wants a cranky baby when you get in from work. Grandparents should be supporting their children to make their life easier not more difficult !!

YANBU Id expect grandparents to follow the current routine my child had.

I agree with everything secretnetter has said.

Being a working parent is stressful enough. You don't need this additional stress. If you are working you just can't have your toddler sleeping late in the afternoon so that they don't sleep at night. You have to be able to get them to bed at a decent time so that you get some rest and can do your job the next. It doesnt work otherwise.

Someone who isnt willing to do that isnt willing to have your child for you iyswim. It's no good if they do it in a eay that makes life impossible.

Paid childcare is the way to resolve this, I'm afraid. I remember saying to my Mum when dd was little that I felt childcare should be on a "business footing" and although she laughed her head off as though I was being daft, I think this was the right idea.

With nursery, you can say " I don't want dc napping after 4pm" and ime they will do it. I certainly did this with ds. They will also keep naps to a certain length for you.

With ds (dc2) it was hopeless if he wouldn't sleep because that had a knock on effect on getting dd to bed, and she had to get to bed so that she could go to school the next day. She's 5 years older so could hardly go to bed before him or at the same time.

I think some mnetters come over very gleeful at the idea of people who don't pay for childcare getting a raw deal - jealousy basically at people getting something for free and wanting it to be no good. You can't say to a working Mum "it's tough, you have to have your dc up until 10 pm (or whatever)".

Sorry for typos, apostrophe failures etc

As a gm who has her gs 2 days a week I would be quite insulted if my dil reeled off a list of Do's and Don't's regarding his care. . I know him very well after his 14 months and which route his routine needs to take for him to be a happy boy. If she felt she needed to instruct me I would rather she took her instructions to a nursery tbh. . As it is she knows I have his best interests at heart so leaves me to it. .

YANBU... I hate the notion of 'well they're saving you money on childcare so they can pretty much do what they want'. I don't believe in that and I think parents' reasonable requests should be respected e.g. not letting a baby sleep after 4pm is perfectly reasonable.

Yes you could choose to pay for a professional but the majority of GP caring for their GC are doing it because they want to spend time with them not to save you money. How many GP would be offended if they offered to look after their GC but parents said 'no thanks, we'd prefer to use a nursery'. The majority I suspect.

How much of a problem is it?
Is it nearly everyday the baby is oversleeping by hours, this is then causing you regular problems at night? Like being woken up several times, or the baby not settling until 12.
Or at the other end only ccasionally and maybe having half an hour, or our extra?

Is it just that she really does hate waking a sleeping baby and won't try, or the baby screams for an hour when waking?

What and how you say anything depends on the balance.
Minor disruption to you but baby hell for her when waking, probably best to over look it. Naps change so quickly with babies and toddlers.
Hell for you every night but she doesn't want to wake a baby on principle , then a chat to explain things would be good as she may not realize.

I second what Topas said - most grandparents who do provide childcare do it because they want to and would be offended if paid for childcare was used - this is certainly the case for us. There seems to be a consensus on here that because you aren't paying them, you should be so grateful that you can't say a thing.

There has to be compromise - you can't have them raise your children exactly as you would and you need to pick your battles as to what is important to be done your way but something like not allowing naps past 4pm is perfectly reasonable. Other areas, you will have to let go and allow them to parent their way.

Many posters also believe any form of sleep interference/waking children from naps/sleep training is cruel. They simply don't understand what it is like to have a child that functions much better when in a less flexible routine - some children will be completely flexible and sleep when they're tired for as long as they need. Others need help in doing so and need to be woken up - doing this gently is not cruel, it's instilling good sleep practice into a child for when they grow up.

Yes I think your MIL should stick with your routine. Help is only help if it is actually helpful.

Why don't you pay for childcare then.

Can't take advantage and then moan about it.

Help is only help if it is actually helpful

Love this phrase. I think it sums up everything about this sort of situation really.

I think this is one where it really depends what sort of baby you had/ have. DS is woken from his afternoon nap everyday. He's 2.5 and he has two hours and that really is enough! If he sleeps past about 2.30 then he goes to bed late and I can't let him sleep in as we need to all be up at 7.

My mum looks after him one day a week and wakes him and it's fine. I obviously can't and wouldn't make her wake him up but I am very grateful that she does.

YABU and ungrateful.